Kevin
by Claire Randall Fraser
Summary: This is my follow up to That Girl. It's really Kevin's story of losing Penelope to Derek and how he's dealing with the aftermath. You'll also get insight into Dave Rossi's POV and a little bit of M/G. It's a long one-shot. Please R/R.


**Hello Everyone,**

**No one will ever accuse me of being Kevin's biggest fan but sometimes I do feel for him. In my slightly delusional and way too invested imagination, D & P are meant to be so having Kevin stand in their way is unacceptable. The poor sap has done nothing wrong but sometimes I treat him no better than unsub.**

**This is a Kevin's reaction to the events that took place in _That Girl_. In no way shape or form do I condone cheating but as I age the more I realize that nothing, especially in the case of loving and being loved, is black and white.**

**I don't own Criminal Minds. If I did then Kevin never would have been. Sorry, Kev.**

**Kevin**

_Jonathan Higgins: "It's a terribly old cliché, but it is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all." _

_Thomas Magnum: "No, it's not."_

_-Magnum, P.I._

The ache in his wrist and the pounding in his skull are what wakes him up. He hasn't been in this much pain, at least physical pain, in well he can't remember the last time he hurt this bad.

Grandma Lynch always taught that alcohol was the devil's work and if Kevin didn't appreciate her lesson before he certainly does now. But too much tequila and a night spent in the emergency room will school even the most diehard nonbeliever that liquor, heartbreak, and male pride don't mix.

How long he'd been asleep for he has no idea but what he does know is that he has a decision to make - relieve his ridiculously full bladder or ignore it and pull the covers over his head and will himself to forget.

Forget that he made an ass out of himself in front of his ex and her new boyfriend, forget that he's probably getting fired and forget that the last 15 days were real instead of some prolonged bad dream.

They say that hindsight is 20/20 but he honestly didn't see it coming. Kevin loved her and he knew, positively knew that she loved him back and if a small secret part of her was also in love with her best guy friend, then so be it. It was a small price to pay for having her in his life.

But Penelope and Morgan had seven long years (three of which she spent with Kevin) to act on any lingering romantic feelings. That's 2556 days including an extra day due to a leap year to throw caution to the wind and change their status from friends to lovers.

And with each passing day, week, month and year when the change doesn't happen any concerns Kevin may have had in the beginning slowly and thoroughly melted away. Until two-weeks ago he truly believed that the love they shared was the one constant he could depend on.

_The look on her face when she opens the door is one that he instantly recognizes but never expected to see from Penelope. It's a look he first encountered freshman year in college when Megan Slopes, his first everything, told him, "it's not you, it's me." _

_It's a look he would see again three years later when Janice Chu, after only three months as his girlfriend decided that she needed a break, needed time to be alone but within the week started dating Marcus Dalton, the junior point guard she tutored in math. _

_It's a look he would see twice more before meeting Penelope Garcia, Tech Goddess Extraordinaire. A look that shouts that he, Kevin Lynch, is no longer enough. And not being enough, no matter how many times he's told, is something he will never get used to._

_As he slowly crumbles to dust from the inside out, Penelope tells him that he's the best of the best and deserves to be loved by a woman who can give her whole heart to him. That she never set out to fall in love with someone else. Never set out to hurt him. _

_When he tells her that he's wants to work things out she stops him with her next confession. _

"_We slept together, Kevin. We didn't plan to, it just happened."_

_He can't help but to repeat her last three words._

"_It. just. happened." As if the lack of intent is somehow less hurtful than if it had been a premeditated fucking._

_When he asks for the man's name, she won't answer. It's a ridiculous question, anyway. The objects in the room broadcast his identity loud and clear._

_From the "best couch EVAH" she and Morgan bought while on a trip to D.C.; to the framed pictures on the fireplace mantel where Morgan is the dominant theme; to the way Penelope stands before him fidgeting with the ends of the ribbon on her favorite sweater. _

_The very same sweater Morgan gave her three months prior on her birthday. She always looks so beautiful in it. Kevin suddenly realizes that he hates that stupid sweater._

_Yeah, she didn't have to say._

No longer able to deny his screaming bladder, Kevin quickly moves to roll out of bed only to yelp out in pain when he lands on his right arm. An arm that is covered by a cast that runs from the base of his hand to the middle of his forearm.

Racing to the bathroom he ignores the sounds of the T.V. from the living room. He must have left it on sometime last night. Peeing comes first; he'll turn it off when he's done.

On the way out he grabs his glasses and the sight before him through the bedroom door stops him in his tracks.

With one arm slung along the top of the couch and with an ankle crossed on the opposite knee, Agent David Rossi sits in the middle of the living room like he owns the place. With his perfectly groomed goatee and impeccably tailored Italian shirt and slacks he is a study in serenity and order in an otherwise chaotic room.

Looking around him, Kevin can't help the rush of embarrassment that floods his body. Red hot, it stains the back of his neck like a sunburn.

Housekeeping was never his strong suit but the last couple of weeks have left him too drained to keep his propensity for clutter at a manageable level. If he'd known he was to have company he would have straightened up a bit or at the very least removed the dirty pair of superman boxers that are now taunting him from the corner of the room.

Turning his head to look at the younger man, Dave gives him the onceover from head to toe and then back again.

Being deconstructed by a profiler, especially one of David Rossi's caliber, is like having your skin peeled back leaving muscle, nerves and bone exposed to the elements.

Feeling stripped bare, it takes all of Kevin's limited strength not to peek down and check to make sure that he's covered. No way in hell does he want a repeat of what happened the first time they met. Being caught naked once is an accident, twice is just plain weird.

Since Dave was the one to half volunteer - half be deputized to take the drunk technical analyst to the ER and then put him to bed, he wasn't surprised to see him wearing the same rumpled clothes from the night before. Come on now, he felt for the guy but he drew the line at stripping and stuffing him into his pajamas.

What he did find strangely fascinating was how Lynch managed to look both drowned and electrocuted at the same time. Half of his hair laid plastered to his head while the other half jutted out at weird angles like the quills of a porcupine. It didn't take a profiler to know that Kevin Lynch had seen better days.

"Morning, Sleeping Beauty. How you feeling?"

Kevin was in too much pain to lie.

"I feel like shit."

"You look like shit."

Picking up the prescription bottle sitting on the coffee table, Rossi heads through the archway that separates the living area from the kitchen.

The sound of running water is Kevin's cue to scramble to the corner, grab his dirty underwear and chuck them through bedroom door. To his disappointment, Rossi returns before he has time to scan the room for any other unmentionables.

He's carrying a glass of water and a plate with some kind of pastry on it.

Kevin knows the baked goods are something the agent brought with him. Food, at least food this pretty hasn't been in this apartment since…well since Penelope.

"Here, Vicodin. You might want to eat something first before taking these…

Ignoring the water and the pastry, Kevin uses his good hand to pop the two pills in his mouth and with a grimace swallows them dry.

"Or not."

Motioning for the younger man to follow him, Dave resumes his seat on the couch and puts the plate on the table in front of Kevin. Still holding the glass he uses the remote to turn off the television.

Feeling extremely uncomfortable - Agent Rossi did witness his meltdown after all – Kevin keeps his eyes on the now darkened screen.

Always one for the direct approach Dave wastes no time in getting to the point.

"Let's cut to the chase. It's a shitty thing they did to you and you have every right to be pissed off but throwing punches isn't going to get her back. The only thing you're going to get is your assed kicked or another broken wrist."

"You would defend them." Kevin was tired of people making excuses for them.

He's heard it all before. They're soulmates. It was just a matter of time before they realized they were meant to be together blah blah blah.

Or his favorite, 'It's freaking Derek Morgan, who wouldn't hop on that.' That one came from Gladys in Counterterrorism. It wasn't meant for his ears but he heard it anyway.

"I'm not defending them but I'm not going to condemn them either. I've been on both sides of the fence and there's nothing black and white about either side."

Kevin jerks his head around to stare at the agent.

"_You_ lost a girl to another guy?" He can't keep the shock out of his voice.

This is Senior Supervisory Special Agent David Rossi. The Don Juan of the BAU, the Casanova of Special Agents, the Lothario of Quantico who gets more pussy than Captain Kirk. If women were cheating on him then what hope was there for poor slobs like Kevin.

"Yep, ex #2 left me for our accountant. When he wasn't busy poking through my finances he was at the Ramada poking my wife. Cheap bastard." Dave gives a sarcastic snort before continuing.

"I loved her but to tell you the truth my ego hurt more than my heart. We were having trouble, had been for some time and instead of staying home and fighting for her, for us, I chose to stay on the road hunting serial killers and child rapists. She accused me of loving my job more than I loved her and she was right."

He pauses to take a sip of water.

"So she found someone to love her in a way I couldn't and I found another accountant."

Kevin can't shake the feeling that he's missing something.

"I don't get it. You know what it feels like to get cheated on but you're still happy for them. I heard you say so to Agent Hotchner." His words are a mixture of disbelief and outrage.

Dave holds up two fingers.

"Twice, I've been in Morgan's shoes. One time I backed off out of respect for the guy. He was a colleague and I knew how much he loved his girlfriend. The other time, I was so in love that backing off wasn't a choice I wanted to live with."

A familiar lump begins to form in Rossi's throat but he chalks it up to allergies. By the looks of things Kevin didn't believe in putting away his dirty laundry much less dusting.

"She was married, still is, but broke things off with me when she found out she was pregnant. The baby was her husband's, not mine but I would have taken them both. Told her that, too but she felt that she owed it to him and their baby to try to make the marriage work. That one hurt. Still does."

The agent's blunt honesty doesn't make Kevin feel any better. If anything it makes him feel worse.

"And her husband? You didn't care what the break-up of his marriage would do to him?"

"No, I didn't. I loved her more than I've loved any other person save my own mother and I wasn't going to pass up my chance to be with her just because the timing was wrong. Cruel? Yes, but I would have sold my soul to the Devil to have her."

Now Kevin is dealing with his own lump. The swell of tears that threaten to spill over are barely held back by a hard swallow.

"Do you have any idea what it feels like to know that everyone thinks that your girl traded up? Yeah, they feel sorry for me but at the same time they're happy for her, for them. There's just so many sad looks and pats on the back a guy can take before he…."

Rossi finishes for him. "Gets piss-assed drunk and tries to take out a guy with a black belt in Judo?"

Shaking his head, Kevin can no longer meet the other man's penetrating gaze. Instead he plays with the smooth edges of the dark green cast on his arm. He has no idea why he picked green. His favorite color is blue.

"I don't know. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I knew I couldn't take him. I just wanted to get in one good shot before he annihilated me."

"Do you want to be annihilated?"

Still playing with his cast, Kevin turns his arm first palm up and then palm down. It hurts so he stops. The painkillers haven't kicked in yet.

"Getting hurt didn't scare me and anything was better than acting like a pansy and spending another night crying over Penelope. Besides at least now she knows I'm not a coward."

Leaning forward, Dave rests a hand on the younger man's shoulder.

"Kid, not feeling fear doesn't make you brave, it makes you stupid. And crying over a woman you love doesn't make you weak, it makes you human."

Last night did not end up like how he planned.

_After downing a half bottle of tequila and goaded by his buddies from the tech pool, Kevin stumbles into O'Reilly's looking for a fight. He knew **they** would be there. But knowing doesn't make seeing any easier. _

_They stand with Agents Rossi and Reid near the farthest wall from the main entrance. Encircled in Morgan's arms with her back to his front, Penelope is laughing at something one of them said._

_The sight of the couple so comfortable in their new roles, so out in the open, and so accepted by their teammates almost makes Kevin buckle at the knees. Whoever said that time heals all wounds never had to spend his work days pretending that his ex-girlfriend and her new lover don't exist._

_They never had to watch Derek Morgan, as he does now, lower his head to sniff her hair. He misses her smell. It's a mixture of vanilla bean, cherry blossom and sunshine._

_What happens next can only be described as an out of body experience._

_Kevin watches as his other self stomps through the crowded bar, rudely bumping the shoulders of those who are unaware of what's to come._

_Agent Rossi is the first to notice him, followed by Morgan who releases Penelope into the ready arms of the older man. With a quick shift of his body Penelope is safely tucked behind him._

_Do they really think that he would hurt her? He would never harm her._

_The person he does want to hurt is now standing before him with a look that too closely resembles one of pity._

_Kevin wants an angry Morgan not one who feels bad for him. Not one who makes no move to defend himself, let alone protect himself._

_This is not how it's supposed to go! He wants to show Penelope that he's willing to fight for her. That he's not just some geek who only sees action from behind the safety of a computer screen. That for once in his life Kevin Lynch is enough and can be the hero who gets and keeps the girl._

"_Put up your fists and get ready to fight like a man!" He shouts determined to make himself heard over the base of the music._

_The shake of Derek's head is his only answer._

_Derek is ruining everything and if he won't throw the first punch then Kevin will. Pulling his arm back, hand in a fist that would make Mike Tyson proud, Kevin swings. _

_For the next week, when "the incident" as it will be named is told and retold around the water cooler multiple theories will abound from the plausible to the absurd._

_Maybe he slipped on the wet floor, it had been raining after all or maybe he was too drunk to see straight. The bar was pretty crowded and someone could have bumped into him. He was distracted by Penelope's pleas for him "not to do this" or maybe Agent Morgan stared him down and Kevin was so intimidated he miscalculated his reach._

_But one thing they will all agree on is that Kevin Lynch missed. He missed and hit the only thing larger than the 6'1" agent who stood perfectly still - arms hanging passively down at his sides -waiting for a punch that never connected._

_Hitting the wall, Kevin cried out in pain and with one look at his twisted wrist promptly passed out._

The painkillers are finally kicking in. The sharp ache in his wrist is subsiding into a dull throb and his hangover induced headache is practically gone. Too bad the Vicodin is no remedy for the pain of a broken heart.

"Agent Rossi, did you know? I mean that she'd leave me for him?" his words come out barely more than a whisper.

"I knew there was a good chance, yes. From what I gather they've been in love with each other pretty much from the beginning. It was just a matter of time before they figured things out."

With a chuckle that rang false even to his own ears, Kevin sinks deeper into the couch and closes his eyes.

"It seems like everyone knew but me. I just thought that maybe, for the first time in my life, I found a woman who could love me back as much as I loved her."

"Kevin, you'll find her someday. I know you will. Sometimes it takes guys like us a little longer to find the one but eventually you'll find your match. My mom always says that there's a lid for every pot."

"With all due respect, Agent Rossi, your mother is wrong."

**The End**

_Once again, thank you for reading and all reviews are appreciated._


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